Two Story Deck Tricks

Here are a couple updated ideas from my old Magic Circle Jerk blog for some fake story deck tricks. These will be good for anyone attending the Genii Convention this week.

Scam the Bellend

Go up to someone and tell them you're working on a new story deck trick that starts from a shuffled pack. This should intrigue them. Ask them to shuffle and hand you their deck of cards. This has to be done with a borrowed deck.

You tell them that you can create a story from any shuffled deck after running through it just twice. Spread through the deck and cull these three cards to the top:

The Jack of Spades or Jack of Hearts
Any 8, 9, or 10
Any Queen

Close the deck and act like you're thinking of stuff. Then spread through again and cull these three cards to the top:

Any Ace
Any Two
Any number card

So, from the top down you have: Any number card, any two, any ace, any queen, any 8-10, and the JH or JS. 

Now you tell your story:

Did I tell you about the time I went to that club on 5th street? [Name whatever number you happen to turn over as the street. Congratulations, your story deck routine is already as clever as every other one.]

While I was there I felt a rumbling in my stomach and knew I had to drop a deuce. [Turn over the two and drop it from a small height onto the table.]

Just when I finished wiping my A-hole, [The ace]

This pretty lady comes into my stall. [The queen]

But I quickly realized it was no lady, it was actually a drag queen [Drag the queen across the table]

And he only had one thing in mind. To take all 10 inches [Use whatever number 8-10 comes up here.]

Of his one-eyed trouser snake, and shove it down my throat. [Turn over the one-eyed jack and point to the one eye as you say this.]

Do you know what happened next? [Turn over the top few cards towards yourself as if you're trying to remember the order of what's to come. Wait for the person to say that they don't know what happens next.]

He shot his load all over my fucking face. [Spring the deck all over the person's face. Then walk away.]

A Card Mystery

This one is much easier to remember and perform. Again tell someone you have a story deck trick that uses a shuffled deck and ask to borrow theirs. Once you have it, cut or cull an Ace to the top.

"This is the story of an Ace detective [Turn over the ace] who was hired to solve the Mystery of the Bent Over Idiot. Do you know the secret to the Mystery of the Bent Over Idiot?"

Wait for them to say "no," then cut the deck into two parts and slowly spring the cards from each hand all over the floor while looking the person dead in the eye. 

"Mystery solved," you say, and walk away.

They might not get it at first, but as they pick their cards up off the floor they'll eventually realize that they are the Bent Over Idiot.

---

Also, Genii Convetion-eers, remember to do this to indicate to others you're part of our secret club, and to find instant stooges without the need to actually speak to them beforehand. 

Cryptophasia

cryptophasia noun The development by twins (identical or fraternal) of a language that only they can understand.

Effect

You find your long lost twin.

Imagine

You walk up to a table consisting of two couples and introduce yourself to everyone. You take a particular interest in one of the guys there and tilt your head at him and scrunch up your eyes. "You seem so familiar...," you mutter.

"Okay, for my first trick... did you know some cards are more ambitious than others? It's true, and I'm going to prove it- Oh god," you gasp with a sudden realization. "I'm sorry," you say to the guy you were taken with earlier, "What's your birthday?" He says July 10th. "What year?" you ask. 1968 he says.

Your eyes get big. 

Everyone is looking at you.

"I'm sorry. Uhm, not to get too personal, but were you adopted?" He says he wasn't. "Oh," you say, "I can't believe they haven't told you...." You look back to your cards as if you're going to try and get back to your trick.

"Actually," you say, "I want to try something with you." You pull out a notebook and write something down in it then put your pencil away.

"I'm going to say a two digit number to you, but in a language you probably don't think you know, okay?" He nods. "Climpity-sklorf," you say. "Do you know what number that is?" He says he doesn't.

"Think about it," you say. "Climpity-sklorf. Climpity-sklorf. [Slowly] Climp-it-y? Sklorf. Nothing? Okay, then just guess, from 0-9, what do you think 'climpity' is. 7? [you smile] And sklorf? 2? So what would climpity-sklorf be?"

"72," he says.

You turn the pad over and it says "Climpity Sklorf - 72"

"Pitpop!!!" you exclaim.

You turn to everyone else. "Oh, my god, this is so exciting. Me and Pitpop here are twins. When mom gave birth to us she decided to give one of us up for adoption. She felt she didn't have the money to raise two kids because she really wanted to get a Jetski. So she gave Pitpop here to an adoptive family." You turn to the guy and say, "Yes, you're adopted. I'm sorry to be the one to have to tell you that." You address the rest of the table. "Of course Pitpop is just what I called him in the womb, and he called me Clonny. We had a whole twin language. Do you remember? I mean, obviously you do, in some part of your brain. I bet you remember everything."

You turn to the guy's wife. "Do me a favor, think of any simple word and write it down on the back of my business card. Make it a noun and something a young child would understand." She does and you tell her to show it to her husband. Then she slides it back in the stack of business cards, unseen by you. 

"Okay, now I want you to see if you can remember what the word we used in the womb for that word was. You can do it, Pitpop."

"I don't know," he says.

"Just try," you say. "Just pull up a nonsense word from your subconscious. Maybe you have it in the back of your mind somewhere."

After a while he says, "Chomby."

You say, "Chomby? Hmm. Chomby. Chomby, chomby, chomby. Uhm... I don't know... oh, wait... are you saying 'shomby'? Shomby as in, 'House'?" 

Everyone freaks out because "House" is exactly what she wrote down.

"It's so great to see you again, Pitpot. Oh my god, I shouldn't be calling you that. I'm sorry, what do you go by now?"

"Tom," he says.

"Tom! Right, exactly. Mom mentioned your new family named you that. Oh, in fact, I've had it on this thing that I've been carrying around with me for years." 

You open you wallet, unzip a compartment, and pull out an image of an old ultrasound. 

"You keep that Pitp- I'm sorry, Tom. You hold onto that. I have another copy at home."

You take a few steps away, then come back. "Oh, just FYI, mom died in a Jetski accident a few years ago. She didn't have any money, so don't come crawling around looking for your share."

Method

Set-Up:

A nail/thumb-writer in your right pocket.
A small notebook with "Climpity Sklorf" written on the top sheet. Above that sheet the ultrasound pic with "Me and Pitpot (                 ) at 3 months" written on it. Creased in the middle.
A card-to-wallet wallet or any wallet you can secretly load the picture in.

Part One:

You go over to the table and introduce yourself. You get everyone's name and make sure to remember the name of the target for your trick. Alternatively you could secretly figure out his name before you start. 

When you go to supposedly write down the number, you are actually writing down the guy's name, and his birth month and year, minus 6 months. So if he said he was born in July of 1968, you'd write down Jan. '68 on the picture.

After you've filled in this information in the guise of writing down the number, you'll fold the ultrasound picture and palm it off and load it in your wallet as you put the pencil away. Don't fear this move. It's not like loading a card in the wallet because there is no heat on anything yet. The trick hasn't even begun as far as they're concerned. And you have all the time in the world to load the wallet as you're repeating your made-up numbers over and over.

As you go through this process with them, you get your nail writer on at some point. And when your spectator gives you the breakdown of what he thinks each number means, you have plenty of time to do your nail-writing. Now, this may seem like just a more interesting context to put a nail writer effect into, and that's true enough. But it's also a presentation that helps methodologically as well. If I just ask you to name a number, and then I nail write it, I have to take a beat to do the work. And most mentalists cover it by saying, "And why did you name that number?" or some other not-particularly-interesting question because everyone just wants to see if it matches what you wrote. But here you're asking someone to translate a non-existent language, so the primary focal point is already up and away from the paper -- it's the interaction between you two. And because it's a two digit number based on an unknown language, it makes sense to break it into its two component numbers. So look at all the time that gives you...

You: What do you think climpity is?

Them: 7

You: [While nail-writing 7 on the pad] And what do you think sklorf is?

Them: 2

You: [While nail-writing 2 on the pad] So climpity-sklorf would be?

Them: 72.

And you immediately turn the pad over. There's not that blatant pause after they name the number. That pause always feels wrong. "I wrote down a two-digit number on this pad. What do you think it is? 86? Okay...86?... why did you choose that number?" It's just phony. If you were doing it for real you wouldn't pause at that point, not when everyone just wants to see what you wrote. 

Part Two:

This is just any business card peek that you know. You could use a gimmicked stack of business cards, or a peek wallet (assuming it also has a CTW function). Or an ungimmicked peek of some kind. The method could not be less important. Just try it with whatever method you have. 

When his wife/friend/girlfriend thinks of a word, then he makes up some nonsense translation of that word, and then you are able to translate it back to her original word, that's an incredibly fun and amazing moment for your spectator, trust me.

Part Three:

This part is already done. You have the ultrasound picture with his name and birth information already in your wallet. Now you just ask for his name as if it's the first time you're hearing it and go for the revelation. (You're not hiding the fact that you got his name during the original introductions, you're just acting as if you've forgotten it (as many of us do after an initial introduction).)

---

• This is an especially enjoyable effect to do for someone who is much older, younger, or a different race than you. I've only performed it a handful of times, but I find that people are more than willing to agree to the possibility that yes, you might just be long-lost twins.
• I wrote this up as if it was a table-hopping effect, because it could be. But essentially it's just an effect you want to perform on a stranger, for the purposes of the reveal in Part 3. The first time I performed this effect was in the dining car of an Amtrak train. You get stuck at a table with people you don't know, so that presented a perfect opportunity for this. I've been able to perform it a few other times since, but sadly I don't have that many opportunities where I can talk to strangers for an extended period of time. 
• Look, I know that I don't have a great many converts to my style of performance. But I'm telling you that -- for me, at least -- people are equally amazed, and much more interested, amused, and charmed by this type of thing than they are you just saying, "Name a number. It's the number I wrote down. Now write down a word. It's house, right?" If I gave a layman a nail writer and a way to peek a word, those are the first two things she would think to do with them. The fact that so much of mentalism is based on the most obvious way of using these tools is probably not great news for the art as a whole.
• If you want to extend the fun, ask the guy if you can recreate your ultrasound photo and then have someone snap a picture while you roll around in the restaurant booth together.

Abracadildo

This post is solely to establish provenance for another brilliant idea I just had. I did a quick mock-up in photoshop as you can see below. This will likely be the first release in the Jerx Elite line of products. It will not be less than $600 and the onyx and ivory version will be in the thousands. I know that Magic Makers and all the rip-off companies are going to put out their own version, but this is going to be the only licensed version built off a mold of my actual cock. If you choose not to support this site and instead wait for some Chinese knock-off, you and your lover are going to be greatly disappointed. Great for ass-to-ass, scissoring, or just keep it on its mahogany display stand to lend any room a touch of class. Abracadildo by The Jerx.

Sundry Drive No. 13

When I was a child, I had a dream effect I wanted to perform. I wanted to show someone a series of 6 meaningless symbols. Then I wanted to ask them to name a number between one and six. Then I wanted to show them that I wasn't talking about the position of the symbols, but an arbitrary number they were assigned on the back. Then I wanted to blow their minds out their shitholes buy explaining to them that I had kinda sorta predicted which symbol they'd unwittingly choose via their number choice, in the sense that I knew what other shapes would make up that symbol. What could be a more beautiful example of magic than that?

Ladies and gentleman, I give you, Easy Symbol Prediction.

---

Have you ever seen foil wrapped chocolate quarters that are the size of actual quarters? I have an idea for a way I'd like to use them, but the ones I've seen are all bigger than actual quarters. Is it even possible to make them that small with that level of detail? I'm guessing you probably can't get them that thin, but if I could get them that small, that would work.

I realize the likelihood of this site being read by a master chocolatier is small, but I thought I'd give it a shot.

---

---

Dear At The Table,

I'm willing to forgive a lot of your faults because your lectures are like $5, which is a steal. But you are now officially 0-120 with the Skype calls. The questions are terrible, the need to see the questioner is non-existent, it puts the brakes on any momentum you've established, and you don't seem to have mastered the technology in the first place. I'm not sure what magic lectures you've attended, but I haven't been to one where I was like, "Ooohh... I hope we get to really know the people who have questions to ask!" If anything my only thoughts towards questioners are, "Oh, christ. Shut the fuck up, dummy." So, in that sense, it really does feel like a real lecture when I watch the At the Table series.

I get it, you're trying to differentiate yourself from the Penguin lectures. That makes sense. But if you own a restaurant you don't put a shit-sandwich on the menu just because the place next door doesn't offer one. 

Instead, why don't you emphasize the genuinely good things you have to offer? Like the time Bobby Motta and Greg Wilson rhapsodized about their mutual love of titty-fucking.

Dear Mentalists: You're Not Going To Keep Using This Ploy, Are You?

There is a verbal technique used in mentalism that doesn't fool anyone except the mentalist himself. And that is the following sentence structure used in a fishing procedure:

It wasn't a black card, was it?

Mentalists will claim that regardless of if the person is thinking of a red card or a black card, they will interpret this sentence as a "hit." No. They won't. They will think of it as exactly what it is: a question. 

I noticed this a few years ago while watching a very good mentalist do some fishing.

Performer: "It's a high card."

Spectator: [Smiles] "Yes..."

Performer: "It's odd."

Spectator: [Crinkles her eyes.] "How are you doing this?"

Performer: "It's not a black card, is it?"

Spectator: "No, it's red."

Performer: "I thought so."

Spectator: [No reaction.]

Then I started noticing it in other people's routines as well. It never gets the reaction of a hit. And it dawned on me that of course it doesn't, because that's not how it comes off to the spectator.

If we were married and you started putting on your coat one evening and I said, "You're not going out, are you?" That is the same as me saying, "Are you going out?" Those sentences mean the same thing. The former suggests maybe I have an opinion on what I would like the answer to be, but it doesn't suggest any knowledge about your actual intent.

If you don't believe this sentence structure is only said in the context of not knowing, rather than knowing, try to put an obviously declarative sentence into the same structure and see how stupid it sounds.

"I'm not wearing a red shirt, am I?"

Of course there is a way to punctuate that statement so it is declarative. If you say:

"It's not a black card. Is it?" And you say it without an upward inflection at the end. Then that does mean "It's not a black card." But that sentence now has a definite meaning and doesn't suit your purpose.

I think the reason we think it's considered a hit is because the spectator doesn't say, "No, you're wrong." But of course they don't say you're wrong. You've just asked a question and not made a statement, how could you be wrong?

I don't really have an all-purpose alternative for this -- it would depend on the actual routine you were doing. I'm guessing in most circumstances it would be better to just simply say straight out, "It's a black card" (for example). You'll be right half the time. The other half of the time you will be wrong, of course, but often in these routines, once you're wrong you know exactly what the person is thinking. And even if you don't, you can take the miss and use it as an opportunity to change tactics. So maybe you say things aren't coming through clear enough reading their mind so instead you want to try and read their aura instead (or whatever nonsense you like to use). It's not an ideal solution, obviously, but if my options are to be right 50% of the time or to ask a weaselly-pseudo-statement-question 100% of the time, I will always choose the former.

Field Report: Home of the Whopper

"I swear it wasn't a trick. I know you thought of the song and it was playing on the radio when we turned it on, but I had nothing to do with it. These things have been happening for a couple of weeks now. I feel like something is fucking with me. It's like I'm finding all these different 'easter eggs' in the universe based on what I'm thinking about or concentrating on."

It's 3am and I'm walking through a park near my apartment on my way to Burger King with my friend, Kate. 

"I'll think of a type of food I want that I haven't eaten in a while and, like magic, there's a new restaurant that opened, selling that exact food two blocks away. I think of an activity I want to do and I'll get an email with a Groupon for that activity a half hour later. It's like if I think of anything: songs, movies, food, people -- anything I concentrate on -- the universe ends up painting that into my my surroundings."

"I've been testing it too. I think of obscure things -- a dog with three legs -- and 8 hours later I see one walking down the street. I feel like my life is a video game and they've substituted in a dumb, uncreative programmer who is just populating my world with whatever I happen to think of, instead of coming up with his own ideas."

"I'm not buying any of this," she says.

"I'll prove it to you. Uhm...name a type of vehicle. No, wait. That's too easy. Let's make up a completely abstract image. Here... name any simple geometric figure, like a square."

"A circle," she says.

"Okay, now circles are everywhere, of course. So let's make it a little more unique. Imagine another simple shape inside the circle. What are you thinking of?"

"A triangle."

"Got it. A circle with a triangle inside. Now, that's pretty random. If I asked you where you'd seen a circle with a triangle inside, would you have any answers? No? Maybe a street sign or something like that. Perhaps some company logo? Whatever, it's certainly not a common thing by any stretch of the imagination, right?"

She agrees.

"But here's the thing," I say. "You just created that image in your mind based off of nothing but your own imagination, yes? I guarantee you by the end of the night we'll see it incorporated into the world around us. What was it again? A circle with a triangle inside?"

We walk into Burger King, order some fries and milkshakes and walk away from the counter.

"Grab a seat and I'll get some ketchup," I say.

Seconds later she growls at me, "Andrewwwwwww..."

"What?" I say, innocently, as I join her at the booth.

Method: The Circle/Triangle force and a tackily decorated Burger King.

You Wanna See Something REALLY Scary?

Today I'm going to tell you how to pull off two legitimately scary card tricks.

The number of genuinely scary card tricks are miniscule. This is because when magicians try and evoke an emotion, they generally do it in the most hack, obvious way. So, if they want a trick to come across as "romantic" they overload it with heart imagery, and maybe some flowers, and a bunch of other hokey bullshit. And if they want it to be scary they make it about vampires, or use little plastic skulls, or talk about the devil. It's all just more bad story presentations where the cards are anything but cards. "The Jack of Spades is Jack the Ripper" -- that type of garbage. 

The problem is that scaring people is not generally conducive to the way magicians want to perform. They want credit. So things seem a lot less creepy when the magician is clearly responsible for what's going on. Like imagine you've been asked to keep watch over a sick, elderly woman in an old house far out in the country. It's late. You're sitting on the sofa, drifting in and out of sleep, when you hear a tap-tap-tapping on the window behind you, and then the sound of a long fingernail scratching down the glass. You freeze thinking, "What the hell was that?" And a moment later the lights come on and there is some guy standing there with a goofy grin, "Hi, it's me, Michael Ammar! I was making that noise. Spooky, huh! That was me." It kind of takes away any tension. Actually, maybe Ammar showing up in some remote house in the middle of the night would be a little scary.

My point is, even with something that could be scary, like the haunted deck, how is it usually presented? With the magician gesticulating around the deck and explicitly or implicitly taking credit for what's going on.

I think I've cracked the code for presentations that elicit genuine emotions and a big key to them is about not claiming credit. When what's presented is not presented in a way that suggests you're looking for acceptance, credit, acknowledgment, appreciation, or validation, the spectator's full emotional response gets channeled into whatever the trick is intended to elicit. For me that's usually joy or mystery or some combination of the two. But I've discovered a way to channel it into romance and sensuality as well (and it has nothing to with doing tricks with hearts and flowers). I'm not quite sure I'm willing to share my findings on that with you cretins, but it definitely can be done. And you can also use magic to generate real fear, or at least a truly unsettled feeling.

Halloween is still a month away, but I thought I'd give you two potentially freaky effects you might want to start working on now so you can unleash them on people in a few weeks. One is just a very small adjustment to a commercially available effect, and the other is a fuller presentation for a technique that is so good it demands a larger spotlight be shone on the moment.

The ideal setting for both of these tricks is to book a night in a "haunted" hotel with someone. The first time I performed these effects together was late one night with a friend at the Batcheller Mansion Inn in Saratoga Springs, NY.

This is entirely unnecessary, of course, it just makes things more fun. I've done it in my own apartment a couple of times as well and have received equally as strong reactions.

They're Here

Part One - The Storm is Getting Closer

You mention to your friend about how playing cards have been used for centuries to communicate with the dead. If you need some fodder for these comments, I recommend this website's ludicrous section on cartomancy.

You talk about how there have been some strange goings on in your home (or you talk about the research you did on the haunted hotel room you're in). You say you want to try an old ritual to see if a ghost is really there. You spread a deck of cards face up and allow your spectator to choose one. I wouldn't do it just like that though. Maybe have her wave her hand back and forth while you recite some incantation and whatever card her hand is over when you're done is the one you'll use. Or have her use a pendulum to select a card, or something like that. Let's say she selected the Queen of diamonds. You put the card back in the deck.

Take the deck of cards and go with your friend to the bathroom or any other small room in your home. Go in that room and look around real quick. You want to show your friend that there's no one in there. Leave and turn off the lights on your way out. 

You hand the deck of cards to your friend and have her hold it betweeen her hands. "In a moment," you say, "I'm going to open the door to the bathroom again. I'm not going to turn on the light but you'll be able to see clearly enough because of the light from this room. I want you to go in there quickly, find any flat surface, set the deck down, and run back out here, got it?" She nods. You open the door, she goes in, leaves the deck, and comes right back out. 

"Where did you leave it?" you ask. "Actually, don't tell me. It's better if I don't know."

You flip open a little notebook with somethings you've scribbled in. "Let's try this," you say. You take her hands and read some incantation from the book. You could spew some Latin nonsense or say you found some old children's rhyme from the early 20th century. Whatever you think your friend will find creepiest.

Spirit, in the dark of night
Come to us, move toward the light
We ask for you to make it clear
Prove to us that you are here

You look in your friend's eyes. "I kind of hope this doesn't work," you say. You go over to the bathroom door with her. You turn the handle and open it just a hair. You tap it so it swings open and you let your friend take the lead into the bathroom. 

On the edge of the bathtub, right where she left it, is the deck of cards. Only now it is cut in two piles and one card is sticking out. "Sweet fuck," you say. You turn on the lights. Slowly you move over to the deck and gently take the one card that's sticking out. You take it and turn it over. It's the Queen of Diamonds.

Part Two -  This House Has Many Hearts

"I want to try something else, but this time we need to be in this room to make it happen."

You open up one of the bathroom cabinets and remove a candle or two and a stick of colored chalk. You light the candles and turn off the rest of the lights. You want the room just illuminated enough to see what's going on but you want there to still be a lot shadows and darkness around the edges.

"Name a different card. I don't want to use the queen of diamonds again, that's freaking me out. And besides that card belongs to whatever that thing is. We need a card that's going to be yours. Which one do you want to use?" She names the four of hearts. You give that card to her and a sharpie. You tell her to write her name on the front of the card and to think of a question that you will try and get answered by the spirit world. A question about her life or her future. When she has one in mind tell her to whisper it to the card. As she does this you draw a large X on the wall in chalk.

You take the card back and press it on the wall against the middle of the X. You sit there in the flickering flames for a while. Then, just when everything is quiet and still, you jump back, pulling your hand off the wall and the card flutters to the ground. This will make her jump. You pick up the card and examine it, but there's nothing wrong with it. You set it on the deck for a moment and brush some chalk off the middle of the X. You do it it again. You hold her card against the wall. After a few moments you give your friend the rest of the deck to hold onto and press your other hand on top of the first one. After 45 seconds you slowly peel your hands back. The card is gone.

"I think they have it," you say, quietly.

"Okay, if this works they should answer your question on the card and send it back to us. That X was the entrance for the card, but we need to create an exit. Draw a circle anywhere on the wall. About two feet in diameter." She does this. 

You walk over to the circle and start feeling around the center of it with your hands. After a few moments you say, "Oh, I think I feel something," and you start scratching at a part of the wall. "Can you feel it?" you ask, and your friend admits she can feel a small bump there. "Let me try and get it," you say. Your left hand continues to scratch at the wall. "Oh, look, look, look," you exclaim. And your right hand slowly pulls your friend's signed card out of the wall.

You bring it over to the candle to see better. "I'm not sure if they replied--" you say and cut yourself off as you turn it over and see this:

You jump towards the door and scramble to the safety of the other room.

Method

Part One

This is simply Peter Eggink's Haunted, with two small but significant changes.

Change 1 - The spectator takes the deck and places it in the other room anywhere they want. The free handling of the deck and the free choice of where to put it makes everything seem completely above suspicion.

Change 2 -  You don't do the effect visibly. Your friend never sees the animation of the deck. You would think this would be less powerful, but instead it's much more affecting. Watching a deck cut itself is pretty magical. But placing an object in an empty room and then coming back to find something has messed with it, is a much more powerful moment.

Part Two

This is, of course, a nod to Poltergeist and Little Girl Lost and other stories about things and people going into the wall and entering a spirit dimension.

The method is all Chad Long's brilliant visual moment, The Wall. Chad's effect is stunning. It really looks like a card is coming out of the wall.

I think it's just about perfect, which is why I don't like it as just a quick throwaway. I wan't to hang a whole effect on that moment. The thesis of this site has always been that context and presentation matter above all else, and I definitely think this is an ideal context for Chad's trick.

Let's talk about the choreography.

She signs the card, whispers her question to it, and you take it back on top of the deck and go over to the X you've marked on the wall. You place the card under your hand in a way that will mimic the Rub-A-Dub vanish you're going to do in a few moments. So you do the fake vanish first and nothing happens except you try and give your friend a good jump-scare by pulling back quickly from the wall. Your friend sees her card again and it's just a normal card. Now do the first action of the Rub-A-Dub vanish, but simply hold your hand against the wall like you're still holding the card. ALL the attention is on your hand on the wall. While it is you just push the selection off the top of the deck and into your pant's pocket. When you've done that you hand the deck of cards to your friend under the pretense that you need both hands to press against the wall. The fact that your friend now holds the deck is an extra convincer that the card is really under your hands. Eventually you pull back and the card is gone. 

Now, let's talk about writing on the walls in chalk. Don't leave that out. It's great theater and taken directly from Little Girl Lost. Just make sure the chalk you're using easily washes off the walls. Don't do it on some fancy wallpaper or something.

Now comes a very Jerxian method. This is the type of method that really only works in informal performances, but it works perfectly. You give her the chalk and ask her to draw a circle on the wall. You're in a dark bathroom and she's concentrating on that task. While she does this you just stand behind her, pull the card and a marker out of your pocket and write "Die Bitch!" on the back (or whatever you want). I prefer to do it messily with a brush-tip marker. To encourage her to draw slowly just tell her to try and make it as even as possible, or to draw three concentric circles. Whatever it takes to get the time you need. Put the card back in your right pocket when you're done.

Now you go over to her circle and start feeling around it. In almost any circle of a decent size drawn on a wall, you will find some imperfections in either the paint or the wall itself. When you feel a bump of some kind, you just direct your friends attention to it and haver her feel it. While she does you get the card in position for Chad Long's effect. Then you just make sure she's focusing on that spot and you remove the card from the wall.

You're done.

Thank you Chad Long and Peter Eggink.

This house is clean.